Dying Well

Mary of Bethany recognizes Jesus’ mission: he has come to die. She embraces his death and pours out her devotion to Jesus in an extravagant act costing of pouring out an expensive oil (about a year’s wages) and anointing his feet as is done when someone died during that time.  Anointing not only their feet but all of their body.

Lent is almost over.  We are looking forward to:

•    Jesus triumphal ride into Jerusalem next Sunday

•   Jesus last meal with his friends a week from Thursday
•   Jesus death a week from Friday
•  Jesus resurrection on Easter Sunday.

 It sounds odd to me to say we are looking forward to Jesus’ death.  Are you looking forward to your death?  Are you looking forward to the death of the person sitting next to you?  It’s generally something we don’t look forward to.  Yet, shouldn’t we if our goal as Christians is to spend eternity with God?

Mary of Bethany was obviously preparing herself and others there for Jesus’ death and preparing him for it.  Mary’s action in the face of death is bold. She anoints a body, and in so doing honors Jesus’ life. She models love for the disciples and for us.  She gets it.

By honestly facing the reality of death, we are more fully able to live. We live with gratitude. We are more able to love one another and God extravagantly. However, in our culture, mortality is often avoided. The stench of death is removed through chemicals, and deceased bodies are cosmetically enhanced to appear as life-like as possible.  How many times haven’t you heard, as you stand near a casket, that the person who died looks good.  Looks like they did in life.  Really?  Is that how it should be?

Maybe we struggle with death so much because we don’t like endings: 

•    The end of a good movie
•  The end of a book we enjoyed
•  The end of a gathering with family
•   The end of life

 1We don’t want them to end.  Could it be because we don’t see the new beginning just around the corner? 

2.  When I close the back cover of good book, isn’t there always a new one waiting?

3.  When I walk out of the movie theater thinking I saw the best movie ever, isn’t there another one I might claim as my most favorite waiting for me to see it?

4. When my family leaves after a great time together, don’t we get together for another great event?

5. When my life ends, isn’t there something far better waiting for me?

Each day, we boldly face death, trusting that God has made a new way for us from death to life.

•  New life comes from this old life. 

• A better life follows a good life. 

• Best follows better. You’ve heard the saying:  “The best is yet to come.”

God in Christ has honored us by becoming flesh and by laying down his own life. He is the new way –the best way. Because Christ Jesus has made us his own, we walk through the desert places of this life, pouring out the whole of our lives, down to the very last ounce, in extravagant love for God and God’s people.  But, we have to die, to live.  It’s reality.  A reality we rarely face and discuss with those around us.  It’s not comfortable to do so.

The book Practicing Our Faith (Dorothy C. Bass, ed) names "dying well” as a faith practice. Through the rhythms of church life—"impromptu conversations and well-planned funerals, through singing, prayer, and anointing with oil, through gifts of flower and food"—the church surrounds those who are dying with tangible signs of God’s presence (p. 164).

Dying well as a faith practice.  Isn’t that interesting.  What do you think of when you think of faith practices?  Dying well?  One way to die well is to prepare for it and prepare others for it as Mary was preparing Jesus for his death and his disciples for Jesus’ death with anointing him with oil.

Just as Jesus was preparing others for his death by all he told them and taught them.  So we prepare ourselves and others for our death by talking about it – not obsessively – but being realistic. 

I have a pair of shoes in my closet that I look at every day that remind me of how important it is to talk about death and to know that it can happen at any moment.

I met a woman at Holden Village in Washington State.  She had on a pair of brand new Nikes.  I have on my 10 year old Teva sandals I loved dearly.  They held great sentimental value and were still comfortable and sturdy enough to wear to camp.  This woman and I talked on and off at camp.  She was from Indiana, too.  As we were standing there at the end of my camp week and the beginning of her second week at camp, she asked me if we could trade shoes.  She didn’t like the feeling of the closed toed shoes she was wearing and longed for the sandals she left behind at home.  Amazingly we wore the same size.  We traded shoes and were to meet up and continue this friendship while exchanging shoes back to our originals.  Months went by and we never met up.  Then I received the news that she died.  It was shocking to everyone.  I hold on to her shoes.  I look at them daily as a reminder that death is ever near, and it is important that we talk about it.  That we prepare ourselves and our loved ones for it.  That we die well.

One way to do that is by using the funeral pre-planning worksheet.  When you die, those left behind have a lot to do and a lot of decisions to make.  How nice to have some of those decisions already made by you for them.  Take that sheet home.  Pray over it.  Fill it out.  Give a copy to a loved one and talk it over with them.  Give a copy to your church to hold on to, too.  It is part of dying well.

As Mary anoints Jesus for his death, her action declares that in life and in death Jesus belongs to God, whose love, as witnessed in her brother Lazarus, is stronger than death.

We need to follow Mary of Bethany’s example – embrace death and extravagantly pour out God’s love on everyone we meet.  They need it because they are going to die too and don’t we want them to have life after death when the best is yet to come?  May we live and die well with Jesus always by our side.